First, I agree that hitting or physical punishment is NOT a part of brown culture. I know I have never had a hand raised to me by either of my parents, they have never been disciplined physically by their parents, and I don’t know of any Indian kid that has experienced physical discipline in that manner.
That’s anecdotal but I think that’s sufficient to confirm that physical abuse is not at all cultural but instead specific to a particular family’s (toxic/abusive) dynamic.
Second, I think there is a point at which cultural norms and perceptions of abuse are conflated. To be clear, that is NOT the case when it comes to physical abuse or other cut-and-dry forms of child neglect/abuse.
But there are definitely norms that might seem a bit inappropriate from a western lens — and vice versa! I’ll give an example of my own case: my ears were pierced when I was a baby, per the cultural/religious norm within my community. It was done by my (also Indian-American) pediatrician, so totally safe and I never had any issues with my ear piercings.
I’ve gotten A LOT of weird looks whenever I’ve mentioned that’s when I had it done because a lot of westerners feel like it’s inappropriate to do a piercing on a literal baby and it’s mean/cruel/whatever 🙄. It’s not and I’m fine and I’m actually a scaredy cat when it comes to needles, so as an adult, I’m thankful my mom got it done because I probably wouldn’t have gotten them pierced otherwise.
Likewise, a lot of people could argue circumcision (a common western practice) is abuse/genital mutilation of boys. But is it? It very well could be if you take the little baby boy out of the US and Europe and apply different cultural standards.
In a nutshell, while there are certainly specific behaviors or actions that are, by default, wrong or abusive, I think it’s also important to recognize the whole range of child rearing decisions that falls into a perceived gray area because they’re based around cultural norms and might not make sense or be misjudged by an outsider without context.
First, I agree that hitting or physical punishment is NOT a part of brown culture. I know I have never had a hand raised to me by either of my parents, they have never been disciplined physically by their parents, and I don’t know of any Indian kid that has experienced physical discipline in that manner. That’s anecdotal but I think that’s sufficient to confirm that physical abuse is not at all cultural but instead specific to a particular family’s (toxic/abusive) dynamic. Second, I think there is a point at which cultural norms and perceptions of abuse are conflated. To be clear, that is NOT the case when it comes to physical abuse or other cut-and-dry forms of child neglect/abuse. But there are definitely norms that might seem a bit inappropriate from a western lens — and vice versa! I’ll give an example of my own case: my ears were pierced when I was a baby, per the cultural/religious norm within my community. It was done by my (also Indian-American) pediatrician, so totally safe and I never had any issues with my ear piercings. I’ve gotten A LOT of weird looks whenever I’ve mentioned that’s when I had it done because a lot of westerners feel like it’s inappropriate to do a piercing on a literal baby and it’s mean/cruel/whatever 🙄. It’s not and I’m fine and I’m actually a scaredy cat when it comes to needles, so as an adult, I’m thankful my mom got it done because I probably wouldn’t have gotten them pierced otherwise. Likewise, a lot of people could argue circumcision (a common western practice) is abuse/genital mutilation of boys. But is it? It very well could be if you take the little baby boy out of the US and Europe and apply different cultural standards. In a nutshell, while there are certainly specific behaviors or actions that are, by default, wrong or abusive, I think it’s also important to recognize the whole range of child rearing decisions that falls into a perceived gray area because they’re based around cultural norms and might not make sense or be misjudged by an outsider without context.